How I Spent My Friday Night

As you can see from the picture, I spent most of my Friday night hooked up to various and sundry hospital equipment. Not a fun way to spend an evening.

It all stated innocently enough. I was at MacFarlane's Pub having a casual drink with a friend when everything went all pear-shaped and the next thing I knew, I woke up on the floor of the porch at the pub.

Don't get ahead of me on this story. I know I have a Dean Martin kind of reputation as a drinker, but that's highly exaggerated. I only had part of one drink. It was kind of a scary experience at first.

I was just sitting there talking to a friend when suddenly, I began to tingle all over. I remember saying something to the effect of. "I don't think I feel well.' the next thing I knew, I was on the floor looking up at the ceiling and there was a crowd of people all looking down at me.

Luckily, there was a doctor in the house and he made me perform a series of test to rule out a stroke. I kept joking with him and I think he pretty much decided I didn't have a stroke. Next thing I knew the EMT's showed up and, after a very bumpy ride to St. Pat's, I was hooked up to every medical device you can imagine.

I was lucky in that the main nurse had a sense of humor, so I was entertained while all this was going on. At that point though, I was still just more than a little bit worried, but soon they began to eliminate all the scary things that could have been wrong with me.

They ran test for everything from a brain tumor to the common cold and it seemed to take forever. Bottom line on the whole story is that I was severely dehydrated. Now, you'd thing that a grown man would have enough sense to take a drink of water from time to time, but I just didn't. They filled me full of a bag of something or other and I began to feel better.

It wasn't a lot of fun, but how lucky am I that it was just dehydration? If you're like me and don't drink a lot of water, change your ways. I'm sitting here swilling Gatorade as I write this.

Thanks to Evan, the EMT who kept me entertained on the ambulance ride and to the ER staff at St. Pat's. They were top notch.